Free Republic

Jim Miklaszewski kept it relatively diplomatic, declaring "there's something amiss here." But Joe Scarborough was blunt: "boy, that's damning," said the Morning Joe host. They were characterizing Miklaszewski's description of the Obama administration's "micromanagement" of the Department of Defense in which communication flows only in one direction: from the White House to the Pentagon. On today's Morning Joe, NBC's Pentagon correspondent reported that former SecDefs Robert Gates and Leon Panetta had recently "lambaste[d]" that micromanagement. View the video here.

The scare tactics that Democrats from President Obama on down have employed to wring political benefit out of the sequester have apparently hit a despicable new low. In comments made about the deaths overnight of seven U.S. Marines in a training incident in Nevada, Dem Senator Harry Reid reportedly suggested that we may see more such incidents because the sequester cuts put Marines at risk. NBC military correspondent Jim Miklaszewski, appearing on Andrea Mitchell's MSNBC show this afternoon, reported that the Marines have strongly rejected Reid's claim, and that one Marine official accused Reid of "pure political posturing on the...

Among the many great parodies that Rush Limbaugh airs, a personal favorite is the "ad" for the New York Times [subscription required] in which Rush, serving as spokesman, says "if you want your sleeper cell to sleep safely, read the New York Times." Rush goes on to catalog the various types of information vital to keeping terrorists safe that the Gray Lady thoughtfully provides in its pages. Now comes confirmation that the parody is telling a fundamental truth. On MSNBC this morning, NBC's chief Pentagon correspondent, Jim Miklaszewski stated that foreigners who might otherwise be inclined to provide information valuable...

Just in time for the November elections, a new MSM theme is emerging: Iraq's not the only mess - Afghanistan's in trouble too. Just a couple days I described the way the Pentagon had systematically rebutted Newsweek hyper-negative portrayal of the situation in Afghanistan in its article "The Rise of Jihadistan." One of Newsweek's "news partners" just happens to be NBC, and sure enough, NBC's 'Today' show ran a segment this morning recycling many of the charges contained in the Newsweek piece. The Taliban and Al-Qaeda were depicted as resurgent, with violence up, the opium trade flourishing, and President Karzai's...

<p>On paper, CNN ''Newsnight'' anchor Aaron Brown has some good qualities. He is bright, even cerebral. He has a smooth set of pipes that are easy on the ears. He often asks smart, layered questions that go beyond the obvious. But as was the case in the days after the attacks on Sept. 11, the war on Iraq is again proving that he is just too studied, too enigmatic, and frankly, too weird, to be anchor material.</p>